“Free speech, I fear, is in retreat.”
This was the harrowing warning issued by U.S. Vice President JD Vance during a February 2025 address to world leaders in Munich.
Vice President Vance said he was particularly concerned about censorship in the United Kingdom, “where the backslide away from conscience rights has placed the basic liberties of religious Britons, in particular, in the crosshairs.”
As the vice president went on to explain, 51-year-old army veteran Adam Smith-Connor has personally experienced the blatant censorship that is rising in the U.K. But ADF International is committed to defending the freedoms of religion and expression for Adam and his fellow countrymen.
Punished for praying silently
Adam Smith-Connor is far from a criminal. He is a veteran of the British Army Reserves who admirably served his country in Afghanistan, and he has since become a physiotherapist who seeks to help his patients navigate various injuries.
In November 2022, Adam was silently praying near an abortion facility. He had his back to the building to make it clear that he was not trying to disrupt anyone’s privacy.
Adam was praying for his son, whom he lost to an abortion 22 years prior. He was also praying for the men and women facing difficult decisions about abortion that day.
Despite the fact that Adam was praying silently and not disrupting anyone, multiple officers approached him and began questioning his actions. “What is the nature of your prayer?” one asked. The officers ultimately decided that Adam was in violation of a “Public Spaces Protection Order,” which created a so-called “buffer zone” prohibiting prayer, counseling, and other acts or “approval/disapproval, with respect to issues related to abortion services.” Put more plainly, Adam was being punished for a thoughtcrime, standing and praying quietly inside a censorship zone.
In October 2024, Poole Magistrates’ Court convicted Adam for his silent prayer, sentenced him to a conditional discharge, and ordered him to pay prosecution costs of £9,000. As Vice President Vance put it, Adam was charged “with the heinous crime of standing 50 meters from an abortion clinic and silently praying for three minutes, not obstructing anyone, not interacting with anyone, just silently praying on his own.”
Defending freedom in the UK
The U.K. Human Rights Act explicitly protects the freedom of thought, the freedom of religion, and the freedom of expression. That’s why ADF International is supporting Adam’s legal defense.
U.K. officials have no right to punish Adam for exercising his freedoms by praying silently in his head. ADF International appealed the unjust ruling from the Poole Magistrates’ Court, and the Bournemouth Crown Court will hear the appeal on July 28, 2025.
Army vet Adam Smith-Connor is a physiotherapist and father of two.
Adam is not the only person in the U.K. who has faced this kind of censorship. The same month Adam was interrogated for silently praying, another U.K. citizen, Isabel Vaughan-Spruce, was arrested for praying in her head near an abortion facility.
Isabel was acquitted of all charges in February 2023, but just a few weeks later, she was arrested again. ADF International supported Isabel’s defense, and thankfully, the West Midlands Police admitted to treating Isabel unjustly in August 2024. The department also agreed to pay approximately £13,000 for violating Isabel’s fundamental rights to free speech and freedom of religion.
ADF International also supported the legal defense of Father Sean Gough, a Catholic priest who was charged for silently praying and holding a sign that said “praying for free speech” near a closed abortion facility in Birmingham, England. A ruling from the Birmingham Magistrates’ Court in February 2023 acquitted Father Gough of all charges.
These two victories provide hope that Adam could receive a favorable ruling on appeal. At the same time, it is clear that some U.K. officials are still engaging in unjust censorship even after multiple courts issued rulings protecting important freedoms for British citizens.
ADF and ADF International remain committed to defending free speech and religious freedom in many countries around the world. In the U.K. as in the U.S., people must be free to live out their beliefs peacefully, without facing punishment from the government.
